s leaving town. He had reached his
two concluding sentences when Anne spoke to him. They ran as follows: "I
may have news to bring you, before long, which you don't look for. Stay
where you are through to-morrow, and wait to hear from me."

After sealing the envelope, he emptied his glass of brandy and water;
and waited, looking through the open door. When Hester Dethridge crossed
the passage with the tea-tray, and entered the drawing-room, he gave the
sign which had been agreed on. He rang his bell. Hester came out again,
closing the drawing-room door behind her.

"Is she safe at her tea?" he asked, removing his heavy boots, and
putting on the slippers which were placed ready for him.

Hester bowed her head.

He pointed up the stairs. "You go first," he whispered. "No nonsense!
and no noise!"

She ascended the stairs. He followed slowly. Although he had only drunk
one glass of brandy and water, his step was uncertain already. With one
hand on the wall, and one hand on the banister, he made his way to the
top; stopped, and listened for a moment; then joined Hester in his own
room, and softly locked the door.

"Well?" he said.

She was standing motionless in the middle of the room--not like a living
woman--like a machine waiting to be set in movement. Finding it useless
to speak to her, he touched her (with a strange sensation of shrinking
in him as he did it), and pointed to the partition wall.

The touch roused her. With slow step and vacant face--moving as if she
was walking in her sleep--she led the way to the papered wall; knelt
down at the skirting-board; and, taking out two small sharp nails,
lifted up a long strip of the paper which had been detached from the
plaster beneath. Mounting on a chair, she turned back the strip and
pinned it up, out of the way, using the two nails, which she had kept
ready in her hand.

By the last dim rays of twilight, Geoffrey looked at the wall.

A hollow space met his view. At a distance of some three feet from the
floor, the laths had been sawn away, and the plaster had been ripped
out, piecemeal, so as to leave a cavity, sufficient in height and width
to allow free power of working in any direction, to a man's arms. The
cavity completely pierced the substance of the wall. Nothing but the
paper on the other side prevented eye or hand from penetrating into the
next room.

Hester Dethridge got down from the chair, and made signs for a light.

Geoffrey took a match fro